Into The Future
by spazzyd
Summary: Years after SG1 is finally dismantled for good, a friend comes back with some disturbing news.
1. Run and Sleep

**Into The Future**

Season: Future/S10 and beyond

Pairings: Jack/Sam, Daniel/Vala, Teal'c/Other, Cameron/Other

Summary: Years after SG-1 is finally dismantled for good, a friend comes back with some disturbing news.

A/N: What will happen to the team long after "Unending?" My shippy side won out on this one. If one of the films involves time travel, and it takes place even remotely in the future, this is how I want the team to end up. Sort of. There are some things that perhaps I wouldn't necessarily want to see, but I've come to be pretty pragmatic about what we're going to see and what we're not going to see… Might as well humor the muse, right?

* * *

_Run._

That same word must've gone through her head a hundred times as she dodged the low-hanging trees at a rapid speed. The denseness of the forest made it nearly impossible for her to accurately calculate where the Stargate was. All she was knew was that he was in trouble, and she needed to help him.

She'd told him dozens of times that the altar seemed inexplicably shady, however he'd scoffed at her superstitious tendencies and told her that she was being ridiculous. Now he was alone, in that very altar. She couldn't think. They'd been prepared for just these instances, they had supplies and sufficient training. He'd translated the text on the altar, something about a replacement and a punishment, prior to being stricken. Somehow he'd known that it would be impossible to leave the altar. Even still, she'd convinced him to try to no avail.

Before he'd fallen completely unconscious, he'd been able to choke out three words: "Ba'al" and "time travel." The bleeding had long ago stopped, yet he simply wouldn't rise. She'd panicked, and headed for the one source of help she knew to be a constant.

Not long after she silently cursed him for picking a planet with so many trees, she spotted the top of the Stargate looming ahead. Picking up the pace for the last stretch, she reached the DHD in record time and pounded symbols she hadn't used very often, but which nevertheless seemed to blink in her mind like a beacon of hope. It was Daniel's only chance. They were his true home, no matter how often he tried to deny it.

Vala waited a moment for someone on the other side to grab a radio. They'd given them radios (but no GDOs) nearly two years ago, when they'd first left the SGC after SG-1's dismantlement. She dared not go through to the Chulak – there was no way she was leaving this god-forsaken planet without him.

"This is Vala MalDoran," she shouted into the radio. "This is Vala MalDoran, requesting medical assistance for Dr. Daniel Jackson. Is anyone there?"

"Identify yourself," a booming voice demanded shortly thereafter.

"This is Vala Mal Doran," she shouted again, "requesting medical assistance for Dr. Daniel Jackson!"

There was a lengthy pause. She assumed whatever newbie who was at the Gate was asking for clearance. Sighing, she almost lost her patience and repeated her cry when a very familiar voice interrupted her thoughts.

"I am here ValaMalDoran. Do you copy?"

"Yes, Teal'c, yes! I copy! " Vala nearly fainted with relief, her exhaustion kicking in once she knew Teal'c was there. "Daniel needs medical attention immediately!"

"I will depart momentarily with medical assistance. We will bring Daniel Jackson to the SGC."

"Oh, I wish it were that easy, Teal'c," Vala replied. "But Daniel cannot be removed from the altar. Any help is going to have to come to him."

"Understood," Teal'c's voice sounded as concerned as she felt. He wasn't sure the doctors on Chulak would be able to do much good for Daniel, yet he also knew that getting a hold of members of the SGC would be equally difficult. Deciding instead to bring what he had at the moment, Teal'c brought the radio back to his mouth and said, "I will be there shortly."

He did not know if it would do much good. And if it didn't, Teal'c still had a Plan B. Even if it involved visiting Earth once more.

* * *

_Sleep._

She was experiencing probably the best sleep she'd had in weeks when the doorbell rang and the dog yelped in reply. Wincing, she squeezed her eyes tight, hoping he'd get up and answer the door instead. Alas, he was dead to the world.

She glanced at the alarm clock – 3:34 AM, wonderful – and sighed. The doorbell rang again.

Barely stifling a groan, she sat up and stepped over the side of the bed. The coldness of the hardwood floor almost made her jump right back in, and she would have, had their early morning visitor not taken to knocking now. Trooper knew better than to bark again, for which she was grateful. There was no need to wake up the whole house.

Bending down to give him an appreciative pat and dodging a toy and two pairs of Haley's shoes on the way to the door, her annoyance grew into concern. There really weren't that many people who'd turn up at this hour, and there certainly weren't people who were that persistent. Maybe years ago, but not now.

Peering through the curtain, expecting the worst, Sam was met with a welcome surprise. She swung the door open and grinned at her snow-covered friend, barely giving him time to register her disheveled appearance before throwing her arms around him in a suffocating embrace.

"Teal'c," she squeezed him tightly. "Oh my god. How long have you been here?"

Teal'c smiled despite his grave reasons for coming, returning the hug easily. It had been a long time since he'd seen her, and she looked well.

"I arrived at the SGC only an hour ago," he answered. "And though I wish my presence here was under more pleasant circumstances, I am afraid I have been sent here to pass along information concerning Daniel Jackson."

Sam's smile fled, as did the color from her cheeks. Motioning Teal'c to follow her inside, she quietly closed the door and led him to the front room. Teal'c didn't sit, which wasn't unexpected given the way he was standing, and Sam couldn't bring herself to sit either.

"What's wrong?" she asked. "I spoke to him three weeks ago, when he was at the Beta Site. Is he OK?"

Teal'c paused before responding, not sure how to start. "We recently received a message from - "

"T?" a voice from the hallway interrupted. "Buddy? How's it going?"

Grateful for the momentary interruption, Teal'c turned to Jack and smiled. "It has been well, however of late, circumstances have changed. I am here to discuss Daniel Jackson."

Jack frowned and stepped further into the room, revealing a Homer Simpson T-shirt and matching boxer shorts. "What's going on, T?"

Teal'c turned back to Sam and bowed his head ever so slightly. "We received a message only hours ago from Vala Maldoran… Daniel Jackson is dying."


	2. Hope

**Into The Future**

Season: Future/S10 and beyond

Pairings: Jack/Sam, Daniel/Vala, Teal'c/Other, Cameron/Other

Spoilers: S10 speculation

Summary: Years after SG-1 is finally dismantled for good, a friend comes back with some disturbing news.

A/N: What will happen to the team long after "Unending?" My shippy side won out on this one. If one of the films involves time travel, and it takes place even remotely in the future, this is how I want the team to end up. Sort of. There are some things that perhaps I wouldn't necessarily want to see, but I've come to be pretty pragmatic about what we're going to see and what we're not going to see… Might as well humor the muse, right?

* * *

Hope.

He'd thought that when the Stargate program had been politically debunked and demolished, that when SG-1 was officially dismantled and the team designation retired, and when a couple new politicians had been elected that Congress would eventually change its mind, and understand the importance of what they'd done for the safety of the planet. What they'd sacrificed for so long.

Instead, as he'd secretly always known, the men and women in charge were afraid and ashamed to admit that they were wrong. While he was never a man to gloat in the face of ignorant arrogant (OK, he so was), Jack couldn't help but roll his eyes when he heard rumor after rumor of how close certain "incidents" near Earth had come close to being catastrophic.

In the beginning, he'd fought alongside Sam, Daniel and Teal'c to get the powers that be to see reason. At the time, the Stargate Program was costing well over $16 billion a year,

with no form of justification, and a new influx of politicians who needed to know exactly where the taxpayers' dollars were going.

That left a whole lot of questions and risks, and the IOA had decided against going public about the Stargate, even more fervently than the Pentagon. He'd always known they were a bunch of blowhards who couldn't even get their own stories straight. So here he was, two years later, sitting on the back porch of a home he'd bought soon after his retirement with a woman whom he'd known for over a decade. Would he trade what he had now for the SGC? Not a chance in the world. Still, in light of the fact that Teal'c had all but been deported back to Chulak, and that Daniel had left the planet in an almighty huff over Congress' stupidity (with Vala in tow, no less), this wasn't exactly the happily ever after he would've chosen.

He loved Sam. And he absolutely adored their 18-month-old baby girl, Haley. Those two would keep him happy for the rest of his life.

However, as Teal'c explained Daniel's predicament and how they needed his and Sam's help, Jack could see in Sam's eyes that he wasn't alone in thinking that something would always be missing as long as Daniel and Teal'c were away.

He knew she felt, as he did, guilty that they hadn't been there for Daniel in the first place, and that they were no longer easily accessible through the SGC. Teal'c had had to park a teltac five miles away in a nearby field after all. Nothing was like it used to be. And Daniel's life now laid in the balance because of it.

"How does Ba'al have anything to do with this?" Sam asked. "I thought he was dead and that we'd managed to destroy all of his clones?"

"Apparently we missed one," Jack muttered with a sigh, knowing full well Teal'c and Sam would be shooting him a look for his misuse of the pronoun, 'we'. 'We,' in fact, had done nothing, he knew; but 'they' had tried their damnedest to eradicate their little pest problem for two years. It was ironic that they'd managed to get rid of him a few months before the Stargate Program was shut down.

"When I arrived on the planet, Krishnul, I had two of Ba'al's former Jaffa with me," Teal'c explained. "They recognized the altar that was housed inside the Temple of Nale."

Jack frowned. "Did they know why Daniel was knocked unconscious?"

Teal'c shook his head. "No. However, they were able to determine that Daniel Jackson would be held in stasis until such time when Ba'al returned with Krishnul's prize possessions. But there is a limit to how long he will be held in stasis before he is killed."

"What do you mean by 'prized possessions,' Teal'c?" Sam asked incredulously. "Did Ba'al steal them?"

"Indeed," Teal'c answered with a nod. "Most likely mere hours before Daniel stepped in front of Krishnul's Altar."

"So the temple's security system works as a holding cell once Krishnul's possessions are removed from the altar?" Sam asked rhetorically, standing up to pace in front of their table. Both Jack and Teal'c could already see the wheels turning in her mind. Jack shook his head ruefully. She'd been aching for this kind of challenge for a long time. "That means that Ba'al had to somehow stall the device, so he could make a clean steal without being caught. If Daniel was the first person to enter the temple and approach the altar after Ba'al left, the security system would more than likely resume and render him unconscious."

She stopped pacing then and frowned, the realization that they had about a snowball's chance of finding Ba'al descending upon her like a cloud. There was no way to prove she was right without a team of scientists going off-world to check out the altar. There was no way to determine how to free Daniel without having intricate knowledge of the technology. And there was no way to prove that finding Ba'al and bringing him back to Krishnul would help Daniel either.

"I do not believe it is wholly impossible to save Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said quietly. Unsurprised that he'd read her mind, Sam simply nodded slowly.

"Who's at the SGC these days?" Jack asked Teal'c, his eyes never leaving Sam. He knew what she was thinking. Hell, he knew what he was thinking. But he also knew that her thoughts, no matter how desperate she was to help Daniel, were traveling back to their toddler who was sleeping soundly upstairs. He knew what it was like to be torn, and until this moment, he'd been grateful that Sam had never had to fully comprehend that feeling.

Now she did.

"I spoke with a General Jeffrey Lyle while I was still on Chulak," Teal'c replied. "He seemed uninterested in Daniel's plight." He didn't bother to hide his disdain or disgust with the general.

"So… he doesn't know you're here?" Sam asked slowly. Teal'c shook his head succinctly.

"He does not."

"That could either be really good or really bad," she noted wryly. "What's your plan?"

Jack turned to Teal'c, interested to see what Teal'c had up his sleeve. Closing his eyes momentarily, Teal'c thought of what he had to say and how he would say it. It would not be an easy decision for either of them, but he did not know how else to broach it. "I require the assistance of one of you," he said finally. "I understand you have young Haley's welfare to consider, so I must ask that you decide between you who will accompany me."

Jack didn't even have to look at Sam to know that she would be the one going. It made more sense, and somehow he wasn't as worried as he thought he'd be. She hadn't been in the field for over two year, sure, but there was no doubt that she was ready for this.

Teal'c noted the silent interchange between the two, and accurately guessed who would be coming with him. "I have contacted CameronMitchell, and he has vowed to help where he can. We shall pick him up on the way."

Standing up and stretching, Sam exhaled into the dark, night sky. "Cameron? That's good. I haven't seen him in a while. It'll give us a chance to catch up." Glancing briefly back at Jack, she nodded and smiled lightly. This was a big decision, and she couldn't help but feel that perhaps she was making the wrong one by going.

Stamping down the rising panic in her chest, Sam maintained a neutral expression while she tried to convince herself that history would not repeat itself with her and her daughter. She would be coming home with Daniel, and her daughter would grow up to know her, hate her, love her and confide in her, just as she'd always anticipated. And, on top of that, Sam would figure out a way to convince Daniel to stay on Earth and Teal'c to visit more.

As soon as they were all home, safe and sound.

There was nothing to worry about.

Sam swallowed and turned back to the guys. "Listen, Teal'c, I obviously need to change, and I… uh… Have some things to take care of first. Could you give me thirty minutes?"

"Of course," Teal'c assured. "I understand your concern, SamanthaCarter."

Sam nodded and smiled, hurrying back into the house before she could change her mind.

Teal'c sat back in his chair and gazed upon the spectacular view above Colorado Springs. "She has not changed from the way she was prior to your union, O'Neill. We will find DanielJackson together."

Jack nodded but was slow to respond. His mind was on Sam, and how he knew she was agonizing over leaving Haley. "She'll regret leaving Haley, even if it's for the right reasons. I never wanted her to have to go through that."

"You cannot shield her from all of life's challenges, O'Neill. She is indeed strong enough to withstand them on her own." Teal'c turned to Jack then and grinned proudly. "She did so for over 20 years."

Jack chuckled at Teal'c's tone. "Yes. When you're right, you're right." With that, Jack stood up with a groan and a crack, proving why Sam had been the obvious choice between the two of them to accompany Teal'c. "Make sure you bring Daniel home in one piece, OK, T? I want my daughter to celebrate Christmas this year with ALL of her uncles."

Teal'c smiled as he followed Jack into the house. "Understood, O'Neill."


End file.
